


All I Ever Wanted Was to Be Your Spine

by jeromesqualor



Category: American Animals (2018)
Genre: M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-20 16:30:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17026161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeromesqualor/pseuds/jeromesqualor
Summary: “You look so cute like that,” Warren says, and like so much between them, it’s part-joke, part-dare.





	All I Ever Wanted Was to Be Your Spine

**Author's Note:**

> I just rewatched the film and wanted to write something small for these two. Set sometime before New York.

Warren’s slept with guys before – well, everything but. He’s gone to those bars, made out with older men who insistently grabbed his ass, given handjobs to babyfaced twinks in toilet cubicles, had a guy suck him off, his hips stuttering forward, a hand knotted in the guy’s hair. It’s not that he’s gay or anything, at least, not fully. He’s slept with girls – had actual girlfriends, even, though never for long. He likes touch, and closeness, and his tastes are wide and varied.

But he’s not sure when this… _thing_ with Spencer started. They’re in his car, sharing a blunt, and the high makes his thoughts come a little slower: _there is no “thing”_ , his brain announces eventually, a reminder to vigilantly correct himself.

Spencer is drawing in his notebook, but he’s holding it at an angle that blocks Warren’s view. He always looks so incredibly intent when he’s drawing, like the whole world is reduced to the spot where his pencil meets the paper.

“You look so cute like that,” Warren says, and like so much between them, it’s part-joke, part-dare.

Spencer doesn’t look up. “I’m almost finished, Warren.” His non-drawing hand reaches blindly over, takes the blunt from between Warren’s fingers. His cheeks hollow on the inhale, and Warren feels a hot curl of want in his stomach.

The problem isn’t that Spencer’s a guy or anything. It’s that he’s Spencer, _his_ Spencer, his best friend, his literal fucking partner in crime. People gravitate to Warren easily, but they always get worn out on him eventually. (“A little bit of you is a lot,” Jessica said when she broke up with him, just a few days before graduation.) Spencer’s the only thing Warren’s ever had that’s lasted.

He passes the blunt back, and after a couple more strokes of the pencil, the drawing’s finished. He closes the notebook without showing Warren the picture, then looks over at him, a thousand-watt smile on his face.

“What were you saying?” he asks, and Warren’s not sure if he’s imagining the current he feels running just under the surface. Part-joke, part-dare.

Warren’s never had particularly good impulse control, and so he keeps poking at this bruise in his own chest, pushing against the unspoken rules of their friendship, seeing how much he can get away with. A hand tousling Spencer’s hair that lingers on the nape of his neck; a clap on the shoulder that pulls him flush to his side; a big sloppy kiss on the cheek that’ll make Spencer giggle and playfully push him away. He’s terrified that one day he’ll push too hard or go too far and Spencer will call him a fag and never fucking speak to him again – it’s the scariest thought in the world, because at least in prison Spencer would be there with him – and yet it’s never enough to stop him from pushing. It’s not like it’s happened so far.

He rests the blunt on the lip of the ashtray on the dashboard. “I was saying,” he says, voice thick, head lolling back against the headrest, “how fucking sexy you look tonight.”

Spencer splutters a laugh, but he doesn’t break eye contact. The thousand-watt smile still in place. “Yeah?” he says, voice low and mock-seductive, barely suppressing a chuckle, and Warren is legitimately embarrassed at how it goes straight to his crotch.

“Yeah,” he says, turning his body in the car seat to face Spencer more fully, folding a leg underneath himself. “You’re so fucking hot, man, I can’t deal with it.”

Spencer’s still cradling his notebook in his lap, fingers absentmindedly stroking the spine. The thought of climbing into his lap comes to Warren unbidden, but he’ll admit to not trying very hard to shake it off. Straddling his legs, chests flush against each other, kissing slow and deep and wet, hands sliding up shirts to get at bare skin, open-mouthed kisses along his neck and a firm hand on his ass.

He should be trying to find the best possible out, but his mouth moves faster than his brain.

“Once I got a handjob off a guy just because he looked kind of like you. I pretended it _was_ you,” he says, more honest than he means to, then flashes a grin. “He was so angry when I moaned your name.”

(That part didn’t happen, but it makes a better story.)

Spencer huffs out a laugh, but he isn’t making eye contact anymore. His body is turned towards Warren, but he’s looking down at his hands, stroking the cover of his notebook. “Warren –” he says, and even though it’s a warning, you can hear the smile in it.

“I’ve never actually _fucked_ a guy, though,” Warren continues, light and jokey, unable to keep himself from grinning, “You know. Anal. I’m saving myself for you.”

(It takes a few seconds after he says it for him to realise it's true.)

Spencer doesn’t react audibly, and so there’s a long pause before Warren sees in the low light that he’s blushing. He’s gripping the notebook tightly now, knuckles whitening.

Warren thinks that maybe he crossed whatever Spencer’s invisible line is. He expects to be scared – of how Spencer will react, of losing him forever – so he’s taken by surprise when a wave of anger comes instead. _I guess Spencer is just as full of bullshit as everyone else_ , he thinks, inexplicably.

“Spence,” he says, shaking him gently by the shoulder. “Are you fucking okay?”

Spencer looks dazed when he looks up. Warren tries to decode the look in his eyes, but he can’t quite figure it out. There’s sadness there, and fondness, and something else he can’t decipher.

“Yeah, I just,” he lets out a sigh, “Not really in the mood for gay chicken right now.”

 _Oh_. It hits him really hard, and he’s not sure why. It’s the perfect out. The ultimate cover for if he ever pushed to hard at the boundaries of this… _thing_. But he finds himself furious that Spencer could think he was just playing a _game_ , even though he thought that was exactly what he wanted him to think. He keeps his hand on Spencer’s shoulder, lets his fingers stroke the spot where the shoulder meets his neck. He leans forward to press their foreheads together.

“Me neither,” he says, low and breathy. Part-joke, part-dare. Spencer squeezes his eyes shut.

He can feel Spencer’s breath on his face. Warren’s fingers are still stroking the place his shoulder and neck meet, down towards his collarbone and back towards the top of his spine. Spencer’s hand curls around his knee, jutting out from the way he has his leg folded up. Every cell in Warren’s body hums.

Spencer makes this tiny satisfied sound in the back of his throat when he strokes the nape of his neck. Warren doesn’t think he’s ever wanted to kiss someone so badly.

He starts going through his mental list of reasons this doesn’t count. _We’re high, we’re just fucking around, technically nothing’s even happened_. None of them stick like they should, and he wants to push. Wants to see how much he can get away with. _Wants_.

His right hand is at the nape of Spencer’s neck, so he moves his left to his lower back. He rubs small circles there, then slides underneath the layers of fabric, palm splayed flat against Spencer’s warm skin. This gives Warren enough purchase to slide him closer, right to the edge of the car seat. Their heads slide from resting against foreheads to shoulders to accommodate the new closeness. _We’re literally just hugging_ , Warren thinks, yet somehow the intimacy of it makes his breath catch. He breathes Spencer in, trying to memorise how he smells, but all he can smell is weed.

One of Spencer’s hands is still on Warren’s knee; the other is still clutching his notebook. Warren’s desperate for something, anything, and he can’t keep his mind off how well their bodies would slot together – every part of his body touching Spencer’s, every patch of skin, every nerve ending – how well Spencer’s cock would slot into his _mouth_ –

Then the hand on his knee starts sliding up his thigh, and he stops thinking about much of anything.


End file.
